Sacrifice by Fire
by Eohna
Summary: An summary/essay on the holocaust. Specifically on Hitler's background and what led up to it. 2010. Rated for thematic elements.


Sacrifice by Fire

It was 1940 and nobody knew that in a mere five years World War II would be over. Everyone realized the irony of the fact that this war's predecessor (WWI) had been called the "War to end all wars" and in only a handful of years that name had proved false. Yet if WWI was the "War to end all wars" than WWII was simply "The Massacre" It was. From the day that Adolf Hitler invaded Austria through the time after the Red Army swept across Germany the ground was soaked in blood and the air thick with the ashes of the burned bodies.

It started in 1940 even before the announcement that "The Final Solution" had been put into effect. By ever increasing degrees it went, from ghettos and slave labor to death camps and mass executions. Throughout that time it is possible that more inhumanity, cruelty, and sheer evil were on display in those places than any other time in human history. The Spanish Inquisition was cruel and evil but they were small and believed what they were doing was killing the evil. The Third Reich was cruel and evil on a scale the world had never seen and they killed because they thought their victims were socially inferior.

It is still not know what all was done in Hitler's name all those years ago from 1940-45, it can only be guessed. Enough is known to lend the imagination plenty of fuel but most people can not imagine the possibility of what we _know_ was done. To understand the capacity for evil the Nazi's possessed you have to begin at the beginning when Adolf Hitler was a young man full of fanatical beliefs and deadly charisma.

After a troubled half-spoiled, half-abused childhood with an already unstable mind young Austrian born Adolf Hitler an aspiring artist and architect went to Vienna to apply to the school of arts there. When he was not accepted he was forced to make his way on the streets sometimes selling enough of his paintings to eat sometimes not. Many times he sold his paintings to store owners to fill picture frames, several of whom were Jewish. It was during this time that Adolf began to develop his world views and beliefs. He attached himself to the idea of anti-Semitism which was a very fashionable opinion at the time; he clung to it like a limpet,

Not long after this World War I began and after initially fleeing the service being arrested and released as unfit for duty he petitioned the King of Bavaria for permission to serve in the Bavarian regiment. His request was granted. During the war Adolf was promoted to _Gefreiter_ for bravery under fire as well as receiving the Iron Cross First and Second class. Because he was considered ill-suited to command he was never promoted further. He was injured once and then toward the end of the war was sent to the hospital for mustard gas blindness, while he was there the news of Germany's surrender came. It is said that he went to his bed and cried when he heard the news, vowing revenge on Germany's enemies.

Still in the army he returned to Munich where he was made a spy to infiltrate the German Worker's Party (DAP) he was impressed with their anti-Semitic opinions and the chairman was impressed with his oratorical abilities. He became their 55th member. He became an executive. He met Dietrich Eckart. Eckart became his mentor, improving upon his speaking skill, teaching him how to dress and talk, exchanging ideas and plans. Hitler began to speak in front of great crowds. Quickly he gained power through such events as the "Beer Hall Pusch" and his rants against the Treaty of Versailles, the Weimar Republic, Marxists, communists, and the world in general.

After that his power only increased. He was briefly imprisoned but was treated like royalty during his incarceration and had the time to dictate "Mein Kampf" to his secretary. In 1933 he was appointed Chancellor. It was the darkest day the world would ever see though they did not yet know it. By 1938 he was the Supreme Commander of Germany and the armed forces with absolute power in his hands. None opposed him and lived. The Third Reich had begun. By 1939 so had World War II.

The details of that most horrific of wars are far to complicated to get into but suffice it to say that in 1940 Germany had encompassed most of Europe and had decided that instead of simply using what they considered "Inferior Races" as forced labor they would implement "The Final Solution" and attempt to destroy totally and without mercy all Jews, Poles, Slavs, Old, Sick, Mentally-Ill, or Homosexuals within their borders. God have mercy but they nearly succeeded. Here is the legacy of this the most nightmarish portion of the war that was never even discovered until it was too late.

It began in Auschwitz. This concentration camp was the first to be retrofitted with gas chambers and begin the meticulous, well recorded, surreal, extermination of the "enemies of the state." The prisoners were brought by train without water or food and then herded out onto the ramp to be separated, some were chosen to work at the camp and were allowed to live a little longer, some –especially twin children- were chosen by the SS doctors to be experimental subjects. It is hard to say that the children were lucky. The doctors injected them with germs, performed surgery without anesthesia, Josef Mengele the "Angel of Death" who had a special obsession with twins sewed a pair of twins together, their wounds became infected and their mother managed to get enough morphine to kill them sparing them a slow untreated death by gangrene. A boy of about twelve was strapped to a table so he couldn't move and a contraption was set up so a hammer came down on his head every few minutes, he was used in a case study of head trauma. In reality no one will ever know what all happened in those camps because the records were destroyed before they could be found. Many would prefer to never know. The estimated number of dead is around 11 million.

The prisoners not selected for work or experimentation were stripped shaved and sent through the gas chamber, other prisoners hauled their bodies out, searched them again and took them to be buried or burned. At first these camps were kept a deadly secret but as their power grew the SS became more open about the mass executions and massacres. The German people sat by and obeyed the will of their Führer.

All in all it is hard to say whether or not they could have prevented it, they could have protested but most of the men were at war the women concerned with feeding their families the children (all part of Hitler Youth) were concerned with becoming warriors for the German Reich and telling on their parents or anyone else they thought were not Nazi enough. The German's who did not agree were to busy to be concerned. Those who did protest were put down brutally. The level of evil attained by Hitler and more directly his commanders is almost incomprehensible to the modern mind to who his name is swiftly becoming like the bogeyman. But it must be remembered and remembered well what he did and why so that the errors of the past are never repeated, as it says upon his birthplace memorial stone. "For peace, freedom, and democracy, never again fascism, millions of dead warn us." Such was the _holokaustos._


End file.
